


Mad Hatter

by Rynn336



Series: Songs for the Hopeful Heart [7]
Category: Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Genre: Heavy Angst, M/M, Sad, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-28
Updated: 2016-09-28
Packaged: 2018-08-18 10:07:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,736
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8158363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rynn336/pseuds/Rynn336
Summary: Tell the psychiatrist something is wrong.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [okoku](https://archiveofourown.org/users/okoku/gifts).



> Now, I want to put in a disclaimer. You could probably have guessed from the tags, but this fic involves suicide. I don't want to make any of my readers uncomfortable, so please, if you feel you'll be too disturbed by that, don't read this. Please, don't. It does have a happy ending, but still. I do not in any way condone or glorify suicide. It's a serious issue. The song for this fic is [Mad Hatter](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7HEY-LTnwo) by Melanie Martinez. It's come to my attention that the song may be offensive to some people suffering from mental illnesses. I'm really, very sorry, and it was not my intention to offend anyone. I was not aware of it until I received a comment about it. I won't take down the fic, and I don't want to change the song because it was a request from someone who I trust didn't mean any offense either, but I apologize.

Sometimes the city can seem almost like the sea, and it’s hard to tell which way is up. All you can do is drown in the shadows of the skyscrapers that loom over you like the walls of an ocean trench.

 

_“…Hey, are you okay?”_

_“Huh?”_

_“You’ve just seemed really off lately.”_

_His smile was bright, blindingly so, just as a flashlight seems brighter when the world around is pitch black. “I’m fine!”_

Strange that we can’t hear it when we’re calm, but our fearful hearts' hammering against our ribcages drowns out any other noise, and the vibrations that our pounding footsteps send through our heads are silent and jarring.

“You better hurry! A limited time only…” an ad on the screen above reads, but we don’t need to be told twice.

 

_“Seriously, you’ve been so different.”_

_“I don’t know what you mean. Do you want me to act differently?”_

_“That’s not what I’m trying to say. You can tell me anything, you know that.”_

_“But I don’t have anything to say!”_

_“…If you say so. I’m here for you.”_

Our minds are often rebellious. They don’t let us forget when we are afraid, and even as we’re trying to calm ourselves, they plague us with exactly the thoughts we don’t want to think. The blood, the brokenness, the lifeless eyes that stare blankly at the sky, sightless, because we were too late, or we weren’t there. We need to calm down, but with every moment we grow closer and closer to spiraling into despair.

 

_“Won’t you tell me what’s wrong?”_

_“…Huh?”_

_“You’ve been staring off into space for fifteen minutes. Yesterday you didn’t answer any of my calls. You’ve hardly had time for me for months. When I came to your house two days ago you didn’t answer the door but I could hear yelling. What’s going on?”_

_“Nothing’s going on.” He paused. “I’ve just realized something important.”_

_“What?”_

_“I…can’t tell you. But I promise this will all be over soon.” Even as he smiled reassuringly, the look in his eyes was unnerving._

We don’t take the elevator. Ironic. On a normal day we’d ride up, saying the stairs were too slow, but now, when speed is of the essence, we fly past the sleek metal doors and launch ourselves up three or four steps at a time, easily ignoring the screaming of our lungs because the screaming of our minds, our fear, is deafening.

 

_He hugged him to his chest. “I want to know. Please.”_

_“You will.”_

Hajime feels like he’s in a dream. A nightmare. He’s running as fast as he can, but he feels sluggish, not fast enough. His mind is shrouded in a thick fog of terror. He can’t find Nagito. The people on the sidewalks give him weird looks as he sprints past them, his cell phone pressed to his ear even though he knows Nagito won’t answer.

It rings and he picks up. “Hello?” he says, his voice shrill.

“I can’t find him!” It’s Kazuichi’s voice. He sounds panicked, almost as much as Hajime is. Kazuichi’s never liked Nagito, or at least Hajime thought that, but now he seems genuinely worried about him.

“Then don’t call me!” Hajime hangs up, and the phone rings again almost immediately. “What?”

Chiaki this time. “Any sign of him?”

“No!” he hangs up, stopping for breath and spinning in a circle. “Shit!”

The phone beeps. “God damn it, stop calling me unless you know where he is!”

“Hajime, I’m on the other side of the street! Go into the building you’re right next to and book it to the roof, I can see him!” Mahiru’s far more composed than he is, but even she sounds scared.

He dives through the door and pushes the crowd of people out of his way. He shoves his cell into his pocket, frantic, trying not to cry out of desperation.

He’s got the note he found on Nagito's pillow crumpled in his clenched fist, probably disintegrating from his sweat. He bursts into the stairwell and takes the steps four at a time. He can’t hear himself now. All he can do is hope for the best, or at least not the worst, because he doesn’t even want to think about the worst. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!” he gasps. His insides are in agony, trying to get him to slow down, but he silences them. He almost runs into a couple of people, who yell after him angrily, and one says his name, but he doesn’t care.

Finally, _finally,_ he reaches the roof and explodes out the door. “Nagito!”

No answer. He looks around, tasting vomit. “Shit!” He runs back around the top of the stairs to see Nagito sitting on the edge, his chin resting on his knees.

The white-haired boy looks up and springs to his feet when he sees Hajime. He blinks in surprise, then gives him a small smile. “Hi.”

Hajime freezes. “Hi? _Hi?_ You leave me _this”_ – he brandishes the note – “and all you can say is _hi?”_

“I…yeah.”

“Don’t do this. Come on. Let’s go home, and we can talk about this. Why would you do this? It’ll get better! I can help you! Everyone can! I’ve had thirteen different people out looking for you for the past two hours! We all care about you! This isn’t the answer!” He takes a step forward, but he stops in his tracks again as Nagito takes a small warning step back toward the edge.

“You don’t understand.” Nagito’s eyes are dark, hooded. “Don’t make this any harder.”

“I’m your fucking _boyfriend!_ I’m supposed to make this hard for you.”

“I love you, you know. That hasn’t changed.”

He takes a deep breath. He’s not going to make any progress freaking out. With an enormous effort, he forces himself to calm down as much as he can. “I know, Nagito. I know. Come on. We can go home. I won’t be mad, I’ll never be mad again if you just come home with me. I promise. Was it something I did? Because I can change!”

“It wasn’t anything you did. Just…listen to me for a little bit, okay?”

“Okay. Anything for you.”

“Thank you.” Nagito sighs and smiles at him. “You’re my world, you know that? You’re the most important thing that I’ve ever been able to call mine. I love you, so much. I’m actually kind of glad you found me, because otherwise this would’ve gone unsaid. I would’ve married you, love, but that was never going to happen. I know you wanted to spend the rest of your life with me, and if I hadn’t been…well, me, I would’ve wanted to be with you forever, too. I do now, actually, but…this has been a long time coming.”  
“We can still spend the rest of our lives together! That doesn’t have to change!”

“But if we did…nothing else would change, either. You said you’d listen to me, remember?”

Hajime gulps. He’s not making any progress but interrupting him might make this worse.

“The point is, I love you. I love you, and I love being around you. You’ve made me happy. You’ve made me laugh and blush and every time I smell apples I think of you. Did you know that’s what you smell like? Apple pie. It’s the best smell in the world. And you’re the best person in the world, I’m sure of it. You’re patient and somehow you got through to me when no one else could. When no one else tried. Thank you. Your eyes are really beautiful.”

“Nagito…”  
“Thank you for everything. Thank you for loving me and giving me your everything even though I never deserved it. You have my heart. You have my life. You have everything I am. I owe you that much.” He stiffens as the piercing wail of police sirens reverberates off of the walls of the buildings around them. “I’d kiss you if I didn’t know you’d try to keep me from falling if I did.”

“Nagito. If you really owe me, then don’t do this. For me.”

“Nice try, but I know you don’t really feel that way. You never have. That’s why you loved me.”

“I love you! I still do!” He shakes his head in desperation. “Baby, please. I don’t…know what I would do without you. This is cruel. You promised you wouldn’t…”

“I’m sorry, Hajime, but for once, I need to do this for myself. I’m so, so sorry.” He’s crying, and so is Hajime. He blows a kiss to Hajime and takes another step back.

“No!” Hajime surges forward.

“Don’t forget about me, okay?” He flashes a bright grin at Hajime, the happiest the latter has seen in months, and Hajime’s fingers just brush Nagito’s shirt before the other boy takes the last step off the edge, and Hajime falls to his stomach, reaching desperately for Nagito’s hand, but Nagito smiles up at him and withdraws it, his hair and clothes billowing around him as he plummets to the ground.

Hajime looks away just before Nagito hits the ground. He can hear the horrible wet thud from here. He screams, the sound tearing from his throat.

 

“No!” Hajime wakes with a start, his breath coming in ragged gasps.

He rolls over in a panic, and forces himself to wait the agonizing moments until his eyes adjust. It’s pitch black, but in the faint light from the window he can just see two gray eyes gleaming worriedly at him. He lets out a long breath. “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, you’re okay, holy _shit…_ ”

“H-Hajime?”

Hajime kisses him hard, his fingers tangled in Nagito’s hair, and the taste of lemon on his tongue calms his racing heart.

Nagito gently pulls away. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing. It’s nothing. Holy shit.” He hugs him tightly.

“Okay, sweetheart, okay. You’re crying.”

“I know, how could I not? You’re still here, thank god.”

“I never left. I promised I wouldn’t.”

“Yeah,” he breathes. “You promised.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. I’m fine. Just go back to sleep.”

There’s a pause. “Okay.” Nagito kisses his eyelids, softly, one by one, and he buries his face in Nagito’s shirt as the other boy closes his eyes, his breathing evening out.

Hajime can’t sleep. As he holds Nagito tightly, he’s not sure if he ever will.

**Author's Note:**

> That was...awful. I had a hard time writing it. I didn't even originally plan for it to have a happy ending, but it was only after I had finished when I realized I could still save it. I'm sorry if the ending seemed abrupt or forced, but I didn't want Nagito to kill himself any more than I'm sure the rest of you did.  
> Thanks for reading. If you had something you liked or that I could've done better, please let me know. And if you have another song you'd like me to do (preferably fluff), I'd love to hear it. I only have one song left to write for. After that, unless I have any more song requests, the series might be over.  
> Fuck. I'm gonna go watch the Office and try to forget about this.


End file.
